


If It Comes Back

by mylordshesacactus



Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Daemons, Daemon Touching, F/F, Gen, Non Consensual Daemon Touching, because having daemons around does kind of change the story
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-13
Updated: 2016-07-21
Packaged: 2018-07-23 17:25:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7473027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mylordshesacactus/pseuds/mylordshesacactus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is about loving things. This is about letting them go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Look I TOLD you guys I was gonna write every single Padmé/Sabé genre known to mankind and nobody ELSE was writing them a daemon AU.

Padmé's daemon had settled before she was quite thirteen years old.

It had been a minor media event, of course, the young Princess of Theed settling, but looking back Sabé could never help rolling her eyes at the tone of the coverage. Because, of course, Parrl had settled into precisely the form everyone had expected. How cute, the reporters had all said. A little dog, such a sweet, pretty daemon, how fitting for a lovely young lady. They were right, of course. Parrl was a delicately beautiful creature. His tiny paws clicked lightly on marble floors when he trotted at Padmé's heels, and his fur was plush; soft blue-and-white that fell in loose ringlets around his feet and formed a comically serious little beard. He was small enough to curl up in her lap while she held audiences.

He was lovely, and together he and Padmé made a lovely pair. But at least once a day some dignitary would make a casually bigoted remark, or a legislator would make some comment that went over Sabé's head but that hinted they were placing politics over the wellbeing of the people, and Padmé would scent blood. And then Parrl's head would come up, and they'd get an identical gleam in their eyes, and everyone in the room would remember suddenly that her daemon was a _terrier_.

Once she'd verbally run them to ground only to drag them back out with her teeth and harry them until they surrendered and passed her bills, they weren't likely to forget it again in a hurry either.

(Eirtaé's Constance had settled next, the only female daemon in their number except for Panaka's surly she-bear. Sabé suspected the universe was trying to tell Eirtaé that she wasn't as exclusively attracted to men as she thought; Constance and Eirtaé kept their opinions to themselves. That they'd settled young hadn't surprised anyone, though given the two forms she'd been preferring in the months leading up to it Panaka had nearly cried when she finally ended up in the form of a palomino mare. She was stunning, of course, delicate and shimmering like gold in the sun. But she was a _horse_ , and spaceships were small, and what was wrong with the little calico, Constance? Why are you _like_ this?)

Sabé's own Kwilaan was still unsettled, cycling between wolf and dog and various falcons and the occasional stallion when they wanted to torment Panaka. She was grateful for that now, walking carefully down the stairs of the royal palace in garments that were never meant to be her own. He'd taken the form of an unassuming brown tabby, nothing that could possibly stand out to an observer.

Her palms itched for his warmth, and she fought to keep her breathing steady as numbness spiked along her body with each step. The daemon padding at her side as they were escorted out of the palace, flinching away from Gunray as he walked dangerously close to brushing against him, was not her own.

Padmé was close, almost close enough to touch, yet still nearly too close to the edge of her range with Kwilaan to bear. But he had been too careful at first to keep his distance from her, and one of the droid escorts had looked twice.

He'd had no choice but to allay any suspicions. They'd practiced for that, so that they wouldn't have to confer. It had been the first thing Panaka warned all of them about before they signed on, before Sabé agreed to be the primary decoy. It was half the reason for the close-fitting hoods, the robes that covered their entire bodies, the gloves.

It didn't make it any less difficult to keep from breaking stride when her daemon leaped into Padmé's arms.

It didn't hurt, not really, but it hovered just on the edge of pain. Panaka had warned them about that too, after their first cautious exchange; Sabé's fingers in Parrl's scruff and Padmé just barely drawing the back of her hand along the wings of the nervous little starling Kwilaan had been at the time. That had brought nothing but a sort of tingling warmth, almost pleasant; like standing under a heat vent on a cold day. He had warned them that in a stressful situation like this one, where the contact was not by their choice, it wouldn't feel the same way.

Still, the memory helped to ease the pins and needles in her fingertips. This was _Padm_ _é_. If she didn't trust Padmé with her soul, she couldn't trust anyone.

One foot in front of the other. At least the faint buzzing in her ears blocked out Gunray's words; she recited canned responses whenever he paused to wait for a response, and went over the indignant speech she'd been practicing since before Padmé's inauguration, because there was one grave danger yet remaining.

If they tried to separate the Queen from her handmaidens, Sabé would no longer be able to protect anyone. Kwilaan would break for her, Parrl would break for Padmé. No one could prevent that, and even Nute Gunray was not fool enough not to know the Queen's daemon, even if his species didn't have them. Daemons were an eccentricity of humans, humanoids, and most species of near-humans, very few others. Padmé believed it was one of the causes of interspecies tension in the galaxy, certainly a contributor to human-supremacist sentiment and the mistreatment of unpaired species of nonhuman sentients...

 _Focus, Sab_ _é_. She tried to concentrate on her bond with Kwilaan, drawing on his love for her and on his fuzzy connection to Padmé. They were Amidala together. They could do this.

She never got the chance to find out if she was right. Without warning, as they were marched down the street, the air was split with a wildcat scream and almost before she was able to recognize the sudden blaze of azure and green as lightsabers the battle droids had been destroyed.

Her vision sharpened and the cold numbness left her fingertips as Kwilaan nonchalantly dropped from Padmé's shoulder. They were too disciplined to give matching sighs of relief and the loss of contact, but the younger of the two Jedi still flickered a glance at her before apparently writing the rush of emotion off as being grateful for the rescue. His daemon, a big shaggy off-white herding dog of indistinct breed, narrowed her eyes slightly as she examined Parrl. The terrier stiffened; after a moment, something passed between them and he relaxed as she looked away again.

The older Jedi, the Master, looked Sabé in the eye and asked her questions, and she lifted her head and answered him like a queen.

* * *

 

As Qui-Gon Jinn followed the Toydarian shop owner outside to examine hyperdrive parts, Padmé took advantage of the opportunity to check on her daemon.

“How are you doing in there?” she whispered, turning her body to shield the canvas sling she was wearing across her chest from Jar-Jar's sight.

Parrl shot her a wry look, and she made a face at him.

All right, so it was a paper-thin disguise and both Sabé and Panaka had been rightfully horrified when she suggested it. But unless Kwilaan by sheer horrific luck managed to settle in the next twenty-four hours, there was nothing stopping him from taking the same form as Parrl. As long as she kept the real Parrl out of sight, he could be _anyone's_ daemon. She was going to go stir-crazy if she had to stay in that ship waiting for someone else to solve her problems. Besides, she _was_ curious about the planet.

“The ship has atmospheric control,” Parrl pointed out, panting in the heat. She wound her fingers into his fur, taking the brief comfort while she could, and he licked her hand. “Kwilaan won't be happy. He never does terriers.”

Padmé felt a twinge of guilt at what she'd already asked of her dearest friend, but couldn't hold back a fond smile either. No, Sabé was no terrier. Kwilaan had been a rough-coated shepherd from the moment the Trade Federation landed on Naboo, stalking circles around Padmé and Sabé both with no end of protective growling, and he might very well settle there sometime soon, but the form almost wouldn't do her justice. She was too magnificent, too fierce and free for a dog daemon even if Padmé would normally be biased in the other direction.

“It's rude to speculate,” Parrl said sternly, nipping her hand. “They'll settle without your help.” Padmé swatted him and flipped the sling's cover over him again. She hoped Jar-Jar hadn't gotten into any trouble, she shouldn't have taken her eyes off him...

“Are you an angel?”

Padmé blinked, looking around for the young voice—right, of course, the little boy from earlier. She hadn't paid him much attention, or the sharp-eyed mockingbird on his shoulder, but the question was so unexpected it made her smile. “What?”

“An angel,” he replied simply. The mockingbird gave Padmé a look as if to say, _obviously_. “I've heard the deep-space pilots talk about them. They live on the moons of...Iego, I think. Right, Ashla?”

“That's right,” his daemon said fondly, tugging at a lock of dirty blonde hair.

“They're the most beautiful creatures in the universe,” the boy said, grinning as he kissed his daemon's head. “And they look human, but they don't have daemons. That's why I thought you might be one.”

Padmé reflexively placed a hand on her sling. “I do have a daemon,” she explained kindly. “He just...doesn't want to come out right now. He doesn't like the heat.”

The boy didn't seem offended. “Yeah,” he said with a world-weary drawl that made Padmé hide a smile. “Neither do I. It is _too hot_ out there. You gotta stay hydrated or you just fall over dead. Wham!” He smacked the countertop. “Right on the ground.”

Padmé laughed. “I'll try to avoid that.”

The boy gave a long sigh and shook his head with the air of an old man dispensing hoary wisdom. “I've seen travelers here get heat stroke more times than I can remember.”

“You don't say.” Padmé pulled a stool up and sat down, charmed. “How long have you been here?”

He shrugged, fiddling carelessly with the droid in his lap. “Since I was little. Three, I think.”

His daemon—Ashla, Padmé remembered—changed form, a sand-colored cobra draping herself protectively around his shoulders and bumping her head against his cheek.

“Two and a half,” she corrected. Her voice was carefully even.

“Yeah, around then,” he agreed. “When we were sold to Gardulla the Hutt.” He gestured with a hydrospanner to the shop around them and said with a little smile, “You can see how well _that_ turned out for her. She lost us betting on the podraces. Viatoris always says, better Watto than her, though. Lots of Gardulla's slaves get severed if they get in trouble. Especially ones like my mom. Most people can't afford that, though, so we've got it pretty good here!”

Padmé felt Parrl stiffen against her chest at the casual revelation. “You're a slave?”

There was a vicious hiss as Ashla flared her hood, miming a strike in Padmé's direction before coiling closer to her person.

The boy's eyes were as hard as his daemon's. “I'm a _person_ ,” he corrected harshly. “And my name is Anakin!”

Parrl's voice, muffled by the canvas sack, commented, “You deserved that.”

Padmé winced. He was right, as usual.

“I'm sorry,” she said, trying to make her voice as gentle as possible. It was obviously a sensitive subject. “I didn't mean that the way it sounded. I don't quite understand things here. This is all new to me.”

After a moment, Anakin relaxed and gave a little smile.

“Oh,” he teased. “I know. I think your friend's gonna try to pay Watto with credits.” He gave a low whistle. “He is _not_ gonna be happy about that.”

* * *

 

And, of course, he wasn't.

Parrl wriggled his head free of the sling the moment Qui-Gon was distracted contacting his padawan. Padmé looked anxiously over her shoulder and turned further away, stroking his head and trying to push him back into the sack.

“In a minute! I can't breathe in there,” Parrl complained. Then, “I suppose we should have listened to your new friend.”

“We could certainly have used the warning,” Padmé agreed.

Parrl hummed.

“He was a very strange little boy,” he decided, settling back into the sling.

“I thought he was sweet.”

He looked up at her with a grin. “So did I,” he said. “That doesn't mean he's not strange.”

Strange or not, Anakin turned up again just barely in time to be their lifeline.

At first Padmé had assumed his solemn admonishments about the dangers of sandstorms were a child's overreaction. That was before the sandstorm hit. It felt like shards of glass, not grains of the soft sand they'd trudged through to get here, were burying themselves in her skin. Opening her eyes was out of the question. Parrl was partially protected by his sling, but not enough. Their pain fed both ways through their bond, and if she hadn't been blinded by the sand the tears would have done the job.

Anakin didn't complain about the pain, gripping her hand firmly in his while his free hand held tight to his daemon's side. Ashla had calmly taken the form of a camel just as the storm hit; her thick fur and long lashes let her lead them toward Anakin's home with little enough trouble, and her bulk sheltered him from some of the storm. Padmé suspected that, much like Panaka and Eirtaé, Anakin would normally have ridden her in this form if he hadn't needed to stay on the ground to be her guide.

It was a humbling realization, that this little child whose life was treated like a commodity would willingly suffer to protect strangers.

She hoped Qui-Gon was with them. Poor Jar-Jar's hands were clinging to her collar as they finally stumbled into a row of cavelike housing, but Padmé hadn't been able to see the Jedi for a long time.

She needn't have worried. As they piled through a doorway behind Anakin, Qui-Gon's beautiful, quiet lynx sprang across the room, far enough that Padmé felt a surge of vertigo before remembering the legendary range that Jedi Masters were said to have with their daemons. The lynx shook sand out of her fur as if she'd been there the whole time, and her partner copied the movement with his robes practically at Padmé's elbow.

“Mom!” Anakin shouted. “I'm home!” Ashla, thankfully, had shed her camel form at the door in favor of a very pretty little songbird Padmé didn't know the species of. She perched on Anakin's shoulder, violently shaking sand out of her feathers as she groomed them both. “I brought people!”

The dark-haired woman hesitating in the entryway was, Padmé assumed, Anakin's mother; she checked that Parrl was still hidden before smiling at her as Qui-Gon moved to make introductions.

“Your son was kind enough to offer us shelter,” he said with a respectful half-bow, and his lynx stepped forward to give her own greeting to...

Padmé couldn't help a soft gasp. Irritated, Parrl wormed his head free to look, and Padmé didn't even bother hiding him. She was too busy staring.

“Shmi Skywalker,” Anakin's mother said, giving a hesitant smile. “This is—”

“Viatoris,” Padmé murmured, and the golden, thick-maned lion daemon at Shmi's side pricked his ears and gave her a curious look. Jumping slightly, she remembered her manners. “I'm sorry,” she said. “Anakin mentioned him earlier.” Anakin _hadn't_ mentioned what he was. She'd expected...she wasn't sure. A dog or a snake. A little tabby like Kwilaan had pretended to be. Padmé had to bow, and hoped Shmi would see the gesture as one of respect for _her_ , not just her daemon.

Anakin was unimpressed. “C'mon,” he said, grabbing her wrist with a cursory wave to his mother. “I'll show you Threepio!”

* * *

Padmé would never have asked it of them.

She didn't want to wonder if perhaps the Jedi would have; Qui-Gon at least had respected Shmi's wishes over Anakin's willingness to risk his life for them, until she'd agreed, and that had to be worth something. Padmé wouldn't have asked a child to do that for her. She wouldn't have asked _anyone_ to do that for her, the one thing she hated more than anything else was letting someone else face danger in her stead.

But Anakin had been adamant, Ashla in the form of an excited little sparrow squeezing into his crash helmet to spend the race pressed against his neck. Padmé had been desperate enough to agree.

And in the end, the final stretch of the race had been almost an anticlimax.

Shmi and Anakin alike had been most worried about the Dug named Sebulba, the one who'd attacked Jar-Jar the other day. The race was Anakin's to walk away with, once his only real equal was eliminated before the first circuit was even completed. Dugs didn't have daemons; still, he ought to have known better than to try to sabotage Anakin's racer while Viatoris was watching. Sabotage wasn't enough to disqualify him, not on Tatooine. But not even Jabba's direct patronage would have been able to protect him once the race began. Not after Sebulba's reaction to the warning roar and the ensuing argument.

Dugs didn't have daemons. But he knew perfectly well that nothing gave him the right to swing one gripping foot up and shove Shmi's daemon aside by the nose.

There were enough humans, enough humanoids and near-humanoids, in that mixed crowd that the ripple of horror and indignation spread like wildfire. They were lucky Sebulba had been swarmed and dragged off by his own pit crew; if he hadn't been, Qui-Gon had half-reached for his lightsaber already. Anakin had commented, with eerie calm, that Sebulba probably wouldn't survive the night in Mos Espa.

Shmi had recovered...more quickly than Padmé would have. Qui-Gon's lynx, who _still_ hadn't offered her name in Padmé's hearing, stayed as close as she could, purring softly into Viatoris' mane while Qui-Gon left to stand imposing and silent at Sebulba's shoulder, watching him until the race began. It was a foolish risk, no one but Jedi had a range like that, but Padmé couldn't even pretend to disapprove of him nearly exposing them; Parrl was snarling against her chest as viciously as she wished she could. There were things that _couldn't_ be allowed to go unanswered.

Nor had they. No one accused his pit crew of anything; no one so much as suggested tampering might have occurred. Podracers failed under stress all the time, and there was nothing unexpected about his catastrophic engine explosion whatsoever. That it was the same fault he had tried to artificially induce in Anakin's vehicle could only be coincidence.

“He takes strength from his anger,” Qui-Gon had observed quietly as Anakin, with single-minded burning determination, passed his opponents cleanly and with humiliating ease on the final circuit. Shmi, who still hadn't relaxed her white-knuckled grip on her daemon's mane, hadn't responded. Parrl, paying no mind to the increasingly unconvincing charade they were putting on that Padmé's daemon always rode in a sling, really, had.

“ _Good_ ,” he'd growled.

And _this_ , when even the miracle he'd pulled off wasn't enough to do more than help a group of strangers who had never once done anything for him, this was more than Padmé could bear. But the alternative was leaving two people behind in slavery instead of one.

Parrl's head popped out as Qui-Gon went to speak to Shmi one last time.

“We should have threatened the Toydarian,” he muttered. “Put a blaster to his head and he'd have lowered his price quick enough.”

“We'll come back for her,” Padmé decided. While they waited with the pack animals, Anakin ran back to cling to his mother. Ashla, who had exploded into the air as a joyous white dove when Anakin had learned he would someday be a Jedi, had sobered quickly at the news his mother and Viatoris weren't joining them. Padmé watched as the sad-faced hound pressed against Shmi's lion, as Ashla's form blurred until she was a little cub, whimpering in pain as she buried her face in his fur in the way Anakin wouldn't let himself.

Parrl gave an unhappy whine that spoke of politics, security concerns and the demands of her own people.

“No we won't,” he said quietly.

* * *

 

“I'm sorry,” Padmé said the moment Sabé pulled her into the Queen's quarters to 'tell her about her experiences on the planet'. “Kwilaan, I'm sorry, I never meant to be gone that long.”

“It's all right, my lady,” Sabé assured her, fingers sinking into Kwilaan's dappled feathers with palpable relief. It was a testament to their discipline that her daemon had been able to hold a form like Parrl's at all, much less for two full days; the copper-and-gold imperial eagle with his flashing eyes and warrior's talons looked so much more natural that everyone in the room could feel the strain dropping away. “It was easier than having to switch.”

Padmé winced. That long walk with Sabé's daemon in her arms, Parrl so far away it felt like he was tugging her heart from her chest, had been for _her_ sake. Sabé already risked so much for her. Asking her to suffer on top of it...

“You're blaming yourself again,” Parrl scolded her, pawing at her leg.

“It's my _fault_ —”

“Padmé,” Sabé interrupted, catching her arm. Her voice was much more natural, and this time her smile came easier. “Really. We've managed to spend most of our time in here anyway.”

“You're welcome,” Eirtaé commented without looking up from the datapad in her lap.

Kwilaan gave a derisive snort. “What's she working on this time?” he asked.

Constance flicked her ears mischievously. “A blank document,” she answered innocently. Eirtaé gave her daemon a betrayed look as Rabé cried “I _knew_ it!” and threw a pillow across the room. Padmé had to laugh, and Sabé pulled her down to sit beside her on the bed. Parrl leapt up on her other side, and she wound the fingers of one hand into his fur with the other on her best friend's shoulder.

“I'm glad you're safe,” Sabé said softly, just for her, as behind them Rabé tackled Eirtaé off the couch while Constance halfheartedly clicked her teeth at the tomcat playfully batting at her face.

Padmé didn't deserve any of them.

After a moment Sabé drew herself up a bit, became a bodyguard again rather than Padmé's best friend.

“There was a transmission from Naboo, my lady” she said, and Padmé's grip tightened convulsively on both halves of her soul.

* * *

There was one good thing about fighting battle droids.

Namely: they weren't alive. As much as Padmé did her utmost to treat droids with respect, as beings that deserved compassion, there was a difference between shooting a battle droid and shooting a living creature. Maybe there shouldn't be—but battle droids, unlike many other kinds, were generally given default programming that did not include pain subroutines. That was enough of a difference to make the necessary killing easy on Padmé's conscience.

The other benefit to non-living opponents was more practical. There was no contact taboo on hunks of metal.

Panaka and his daemon were almost _happy_ , which Padmé was certain would have gone down in history if it wasn't being overshadowed by a planetary invasion. The she-bear roared and smacked down a row of screaming battle droids, turned and flung a marble pot in their direction, and then lumbered back to cover as Padmé's team pressed on through the palace.

They had to leave Panaka behind, then, to help cover their escape; there was no way to bring a huge brown bear up grappling wires with them, and Parrl gave an anxious whine that echoed Padmé's turbulent emotions as she met his eyes and nodded a goodbye before grappling up to the next floor. They would see him again. She had to believe that.

As usual, his plan had worked perfectly even allowing for certain...adjustments. She spared a moment of worry for the Jedi—irritating as his knowing looks had been, Qui-Gon Jinn hadn't been _forced_ to come back here, to help her fight for her people. Whatever that creature had been, with a blood-red lightsaber and the black jaguar she'd last seen snarling as it circled Obi-Wan's shepherd and the beautiful lynx that looked so much smaller compared with the other daemon's bulk...they were Jedi. Padmé had her own battle to fight.

And Panaka's excessive backlog of contingency plans meant he would have met up with Blue Group en route, which meant Padmé's group would be running into her decoy's right...about...

“ _Padmé!_ ”

It was Amidala's voice, not Sabé's, and Padmé instinctively dropped to one knee and twisted for cover at the hard note of command. She was nearly too late; the line of battle droids she hadn't even seen opened fire quickly enough that a blaster bolt scorched one flowing sleeve and Parrl yelped as he scrambled behind a pillar.

Padmé's men returned fire; coming up the corridor behind them, Sabé's forces joined in, and Kwilaan _screamed_.

A flood of the smaller Naboo daemons, dogs and weasels mostly with a handful of rats and Panaka's massive she-bear, struck at the advancing droid line. The eagle got there first, Kwilaan's talons closing around a battle droid's head and gouging viciously at its optics, shrieking Sabé's fury until he beat his wings and twisted and the droid's head was torn free. Sabé dropped beside Padmé, firing with her off hand and pressing her Queen hard into the lee of the pillar until the last battle droid fell.

“Are you hurt?” she asked, dark eyes fierce as they scanned the corridor for further threats. Padmé had to smile. Two of her men were collapsed against the walls of their alcoves; but both of their daemons were with them, still, and they _had_ to make the push to the throne room.

“The main force will accompany Sabé to lead as many of their forces away as you can,” she announced. “A small team stays with me to secure Gunray and the other leaders.” Sabé gave a crisp nod when Padmé looked at her. “The decoy team will be in the most danger. Let them follow you as far as they'll chase, but be _careful_.”

“Movement,” Parrl said quietly from the window.

Padmé gave Kwilaan an apologetic look. “I have to ask you to do terrier one more time,” she told them both. “After this, I hope you won't have to.”

She'd expected wincing; for all her stubbornness Sabé and Kwilaan never had been the terrier sort. What she didn't expect was for Sabé to suddenly turn pale, and exchange a look with her daemon. With, Padmé realized like a thunderbolt, her _settled_ daemon.

“Oh, _Sab_ _é_ ,” she said, grinning widely. Panaka looked like he was about to have an aneurysm, and Padmé sent him a sharp warning look over Sabé's shoulder. They would just have to hope the heat of battle distracted any onlookers from Kwilaan. “Congratulations, both of you—”

“I'm sorry...”

“Hush,” Padmé said with as much authority as she could muster. “Don't apologize, don't you dare. We'll make it work.”

“It's just Gunray,” Parrl pointed out. Panaka didn't seem particularly comforted by that, but he didn't argue the point.

“Thirty seconds.” Padmé kept her voice even as her mind whirled through possibilities. She would improvise, then. Newt Gunray was impulsive; perhaps he could be goaded. “Then attract their attention.”

She gripped Sabé's hand for a heartbeat before signaling the strike team to move and tried not to feel she was sending her best friend to her doom.

Panaka's tension grew palpably with every step they took toward the throne room. His daemon's behavior was telling; she was grumpy on good days. Now her steps were measured, carefully controlled. Her fur bristled, but no more. Not even a low growl as their little group stepped over the threshold of the throne room.

Sabé might end up the Queen in truth, now. All the handmaidens but Eirtaé were still unsettled. The same deception that had saved Padmé's identity might save her decoy's, if only for a few months, if not with the same ease and lack of pain. The Naboo needed Amidala, and Amidala was as much Sabé's creation as her lady's. Padmé wished she would be there to lead them herself; but she would sign no treaties, she would not betray her people that way. The Trade Federation didn't have the authority to execute prisoners, but the more she thought about it the more certain she became that Master Qui-Gon was right. She would be killed and replaced if—when—she refused to cooperate.

She lifted her head as Parrl planted his feet at her side, and waited for Gunray to issue his ultimatum.

“ _Viceroy!”_

For a split second, in spite of knowing the voice had come from behind them, half the Naboo in the room instinctively turned to Padmé. For a split second she wasn't entirely certain the call _hadn't_ come from her, as Sabé shouted their defiance and fired. And for a moment, it almost looked as if Gunray's guard would take the bait after all. But Padmé saw his eyes slide from the fleeing decoy group to Parrl, and felt an ache for her bodyguard's wasted courage.

Parrl saw it too, and didn't bother consulting her. He lowered his hackles, let his tail wag; and with the singular focus of daemons, just slightly too loud for anyone who had ever shared that bond to believe, he glanced up at her and announced, “It worked!”

Another deadly half-heartbeat of hesitation, and then Gunray leapt into action with the urgency of a false epiphany.

“After her!” he blustered. “This one's a _decoy!_ ”

 _Fly_ , Padmé thought after her as the droids and guards raced out of the room on Sabé's tail, and Panaka's daemon gleefully reared up and smashed the nearest door control with one paw. There was no time for more.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Daemon name notes: I need to write down the meanings of my names more.
> 
> Parrl and Kwilaan are both named after Naboo languages, people, historical figures, locations, etc that I found relevant while scouring the Legends article on Wookiepedia but, being an idiot, didn't take notes on at the time. Parrl is a Sealyham terrier, Kwilaan is an imperial eagle. That's a species name, mind, not a descriptor.
> 
> Ashla: A little meta; at one point in OT pre-production, would have referred to the light side of the Force. In the EU, is actually used that way by some cultures.
> 
> Viatoris: If the Internet serves me well, at least loosely the Latin for "wayfarer", which was as close to "Skywalker" as I could get.
> 
> Constance: Palomino Arabian. Apparently Eirtae's parents' daemons are both boring AND pretentious! It does suit her, though. Steady, tenacious little things the both of them.


	2. Chapter 2

  
“I'm _fine_ , Sabé. Really.”

Padmé tried to make her voice as gently reassuring as possible. Judging by the way Kwilaan's talons dug into his person's shoulder in the grainy holoimage, it didn't help.

Sabé was no sheltered Senator's wife, to panic at the first sign of danger or demand that Padmé abandon her duties in favor of her own safety. She was Amidala's second half. She knew, they both knew, that in choosing to serve her people Padmé also chose to accept the dangers. Sabé would no more ask her to give up her purpose than sever herself. She had never wanted Padmé to be less than what she was.

But, half a galaxy away with Cordé and a ship full of Royal Security Force volunteers dead and the smell of smoke still lingering against Padmé's skin, she knew it didn't stop her lover from being afraid.

“I should be there,” Sabé's pixellated image said stiffly. “You're no good to the galaxy dead! Padmé, you _need_ me—”

“Exactly where you are.” Kwilaan mantled on Sabé's shoulder, nearly tearing holes in the reinforced synthleather of her Royal Security uniform, but she didn't respond except to squeeze her eyes closed and Padmé pressed on. “It was an assassination attempt. Everyone here is very well trained to deal with these situations. You have a duty to Naboo, as do I. Besides,” she added with a cheeky smile. “I have Dormé and Typho here to protect me.”

Sabé's eyes were so full of pain that Padmé could feel it like a physical ache.

“Please,” she said, voice breaking. “Padmé, if something happens to you because I wasn't there...”

Padmé opened her mouth to firmly shut down that line of thinking, but Parrl's low whine interrupted her.

“What?” she asked him. He gave her a reproachful look, and after a moment she sighed.

“Sabé,” she said softly. “Do you _really_ feel you need to come?”

It wasn't a rhetorical question, and as always Sabé gave her the respect of hesitating for a moment, unwilling to give her anything but a fully honest answer.

Dormé cleared her throat gently at Padmé's shoulder, an apologetic look on her face.

“The Jedi have arrived, my lady,” she said with a slight bow. “I thought I should inform you. They should reach this level in a few moments.”

“Thank you, Dormé.” Padmé squeezed her hand with a smile. Dormé's daemon was flitting his wings anxiously and she couldn't bear having her friend look so worried.

Sabé's gaze sharpened as Kwilaan's head snapped up in the holo.

“Jedi?” she demanded.

Padmé gave an exasperated sigh. “The Chancellor is overreacting,” she complained. “But if he insists on the additional security, I suppose we'll just have to make do.” Her lips twitched. “If it will make you happy, I won't even tell Master Kenobi his presence is unnecessary.”

“If it keeps you safe, it's necessary,” Sabé said stubbornly. Still, her shoulders had visibly relaxed upon hearing Padmé would have Jedi protection. “All right,” she conceded. “I'll stay here. Padmé, I just...”

Padmé's wry smile softened, her fingers coming up reflexively as if to touch the faint blue image. “I know.”

“I'm sorry about Cordé.” Sabé's eyes tightened. “Make them pay for it.”

Parrl gave a vicious growl at the reminder of the Military Creation Act, and Sabé smiled. In the background, Padmé heard her elevator chime.

“I have to go,” she said softly. “Give Panaka our love.”

Sabé smiled for the first time. “When he's done terrorizing the girls.”

“I love you, Sabé.”

Sabé swallowed heavily, blinked a few times, then gave a jerky nod and disconnected the holocall. Dormé reached out and squeezed Padmé's elbow, and then Jar-Jar came rushing in with his usual level of enthusiastic helpfulness and Padmé forced herself to set Sabé's worry aside for the moment.

Obi-Wan was barely recognizable as the gangly young man with an oversized daemon who had stood so quietly behind his master all those years ago, only occasionally pinching the bridge of his nose and looking skyward as if begging the Force to grant him patience. He seemed steadier somehow, more centered, wiser. But his eyes had a devilish humor in them still; if anything they made her think of Eirtaé. Or Yané, with Veer the sharp-tongued ferret daemon on her shoulder, eyeing the latest model of luxury car she would have taken for a joyride in what Panaka would call her misspent youth.

And his big shaggy shepherd daemon seemed much better suited to him now. Eggshell-white Soleca stood patiently at his side and only dipped her muzzle respectfully at Parrl, but her tail whipped back and forth and her obvious happiness at seeing them again warmed Padmé's heart.

“It's been far too long, Master Kenobi,” she said honestly, aware that Parrl's little stump of a tail was wagging just as hard. She was about to politely invite him to sit down when a strangled canine whine made her glance at the young Jedi who had accompanied Obi-Wan into her apartments. For a moment she was faintly annoyed at the interruption; then something about his smile seemed familiar. He'd grown, but—

“ _Ani?_ ”

His grin broke impossibly wide as his daemon threw back her head and gave another long, uncontrollable yowl of excitement. Padmé laughed. Ashla always had been expressive even for a daemon; and of course Ashla would have settled by now, even if her form was a surprise after the songbirds she'd preferred back when Padmé first knew them. She was a lean, medium-sized dog of no apparent breed; a desert pariah, yellow-brown, the color of sand and dirty amber with banana-leaf ears and a slightly curled tail that lashed her sides like a whip as she pranced.

Independent, Padmé thought; but fiercely loyal, resourceful and clever, resilient to cruelty but quick to respond to kindness, and in every way a product of the world that created her. There was a depth of self-understanding in that form that she wouldn't have expected from the child he'd been.

“Oh, _Anakin,”_ she breathed. “She's beautiful. How you've grown...”

“You have too,” he said, eager and awkward, and Ashla's frantic wagging paused as she glanced up at him. He stumbled over his tongue as he tried to clarify, “Grown more beautiful, I mean—”

“Anakin,” Ashla sighed.

“Well, for—for a Senator, I mean—”

“Someone stop him,” said Obi-Wan's daemon in a tone of abject horror.

Anakin, who was now blushing redder than an Alderaan beet, stammered for a few moments until Obi-Wan took pity on him and reached out to clap his shoulder. Soleca sent Ashla a disappointed look, and Anakin's daemon covered her own face with one paw and gave an embarrassed whimper.

With one last vaguely pitying glance at his padawan, Obi-Wan gave another half-bow in a transparent attempt to ease the awkwardness in the room. “Our congratulations on your engagement, my lady,” he said warmly. “I wish you great happiness together.”

Now it was Padmé's turn to flush. “Thank you, Master Jedi,” she murmured, smiling. “I appreciate your kind words—”

“You're _married?”_

Anakin's voice was too loud, the question too irate, and Padmé frowned as she turned to him.

“Engaged,” she said. “We plan to be married as soon as our responsibilities allow.”

“To _who?_ ” he demanded.

Obi-Wan snapped “ _Anakin_ ,” under his breath, and was ignored. Soleca hadn't moved, but her head was lowered and she watched the bristling Ashla like a hawk. Beside them Typho's fierce royal stag tossed his antlers in a silent warning.

Padmé didn't resent their assistance; but she was Amidala, and Parrl was a terrier, and they needed no one to fight battles for them. Her daemon's hackles raised as he stepped pointedly between her and Anakin.

“A very dear friend,” she responded, allowing an edge of cold steel into her voice. It was still considerably milder than it would have been if the question were coming from anyone but a Skywalker. “Whom I love very much, and have trusted with my life many times. Anakin, I don't appreciate your tone.”

The tension crackled between them for a long moment, and then Ashla shook her fur out violently and Anakin lowered his eyes.

“Of course,” he said to the floor. “I was surprised, Master. I didn't mean anything by it...” At her unconvinced look, he shifted and tried to explain. “It's important if we're going to protect you. We need to know everything. I'm sorry, Padmé.”

She eyed him for the span of several heartbeats, then inclined her head. It was only natural. She wasn't certain she wouldn't have had the same reaction, if she'd met that little boy from Tatooine after ten years only to learn he was betrothed.

“I appreciate your concern, Anakin,” she told him, and Parrl relaxed and moved back to her side as ruffled fur and feathers all across the room folded back into place with a silent sigh of relief. “Come. Sit down, both of you, and we'll discuss these additional security arrangements...”

* * *

“This is offensive,” Parrl said flatly. “I am offended.”

Padmé looked up from packing to spare him an amused look. “That's enough,” she told him. “Not an hour ago you were lecturing me about making sacrifices, so I don't want to hear it.”

Ever since her first term as Queen, as one by one all of her decoys' daemons had settled, Panaka had been trying to solve the problem of how to hide Padmé's identity. For the most part, this had always taken the form of adding slings like the one she'd improvised on Tatooine to the uniform; anyone with a daemon small enough to fit would take turns along with Padmé, throwing uncertainty into the mix. But that would only work in public. If an assassin saw Dormé without a terrier daemon in private, the game would be up.

More drastic measures were necessary. That didn't mean anyone had to be happy about it.

“I'm your daemon!” Parrl leapt onto the bed and lay down, only to have to jump back to the floor as she crossed over to her closet again. “Lecturing you is my—will you stand still?—is my job! And now you're replacing me with _that!_ ”

Bail, comfortably positioned in Padmé's sitting room with Typho, gave a rich laugh.

“No one is replacing you, my friend.” Esperanza tried to hide her own amusement, but she was as warm and genuine as Bail, and her tongue lolled out of her mouth in a silent lupine laugh as Parrl continued pacing the room at Padmé's heels.

Bail reached down to scratch between his daemon's ears, and if wolves could purr Esperanza managed it. Padmé paused just to watch them interact. She was a _beautiful_ daemon, steady and dignified, pure white fur perfect for Alderaan mountain winters. She tended to keep her counsel to herself in mixed company except to act as Bail's voice of quiet caution; but there was a deep, burning determination that hummed between them, and the depth of their connection was legendary. It was always a privilege to watch.

Personally, Padmé was surprised Typho had even allowed her to bring Bail in on this deception. If his daemon was any indication, he wasn't happy about it; the twelve-point stag was pacing behind the sofa, ears flicking anxiously toward any noise as he pawed at the floor and occasionally glared at Esperanza. But Bail could be trusted; and more to the point, Padmé _needed_ him if Dormé was to cover up her presence.

No matter her handmaiden's acting skill, no one at close range would _ever_ mistake a mouse droid covered in dyed fleece for a daemon.

“Stop complaining,” Padmé told Parrl firmly. “How do you think Dormé feels?”

Dormé looked up from packing with a pained expression. “Dormé feels fine, my lady,” she answered with an admirable attempt at smiling. “I only worry. What if it doesn't work?”

“Bail won't let that happen,” Padmé assured her.

Dormé's daemon fluttered anxiously from her shoulder to the bed. He was a little gull-like creature, a phalarope, and he was upset to the point of nearly molting. Parrl sighed and nuzzled his head.

Padmé, for her part, placed her hands on Dormé's shoulders.

“Dormé,” she said, and waited until her taller handmaiden met her eyes before continuing seriously. “You _can_ do this. If Obi-Wan's investigation is successful, this may only be necessary for a few short weeks. Typho will help you, and Senator Organa is a trusted friend. He will not let your secret escape, I promise you that.”

Dormé blinked tears out of her eyes through a smile. “I know, my lady. I'm afraid for _you_. If no one is fooled, if you're tracked...”

“Hush.” There was no rebuke behind it. “ _If_ that happens, my Jedi protector will just have to prove how good he is. Anakin,” she added, reminded of his brooding presence by the door. “Why don't you make yourself useful while Dormé helps the others come up with contingency plans? Hand me that roller, this material creases more easily than you could _possibly_ imagine...”

* * *

The awkwardness between her and Anakin still hadn't entirely dissipated.

He was trying. She couldn't fault him for that; he was _trying_ to be polite and professional, and if they were strangers it might have worked. But with Ani, the bright little songbird of a boy she'd met on Tatooine? His muted, nervous demeanor was impossible to ignore. It hung over him like cloudcover in the desert; dark, heavy, and _wrong_. Even Ashla, normally so open, stuck anxiously at his side. She avoided eye contact and stayed as far away from Parrl as she could place herself, and both daemons were tense and silent.

The silence stretched on as they boarded the refugee ship and settled into their allocated patch of floor in the hold. Others began to filter in around them; mostly human or humanoid, but a few daemonless species as well. Parrl climbed into Padmé's lap as a Rodian passed them.

Padmé placed a hand on his back, shooting the Rodian what she hoped was an apologetic look. There was...distrust between partnered and daemonless species. In a way, partnered species were vulnerable in a way others weren't; a daemonless enemy had no matching weakness, didn't share the bone-deep understanding of the true horror of separation, or of unwilling contact. But at the same time, humanoid and near-human species had a numerical and political advantage in the galaxy—and, often, a tendency to view anyone without a daemon as less-than, sometimes almost like animals.

It was a complicated issue. She was doing what she could to combat it, but with the Separatist movement gaining so much traction so quickly Padmé only had so much energy to spare on anything that wasn't the current crisis.

There wouldn't be anything she could do about the galaxy's problems until this assassin was caught, anyway. For now, her immediate concern was making peace with Anakin.

( _Anakin_. It was hard to even think of him as little Ani anymore.)

Her fingers ran through Parrl's silky fur, taking strength from his albeit grumpy love for her.

“Suddenly I'm afraid,” she said quietly, a bit of the tension unknotting in her chest with the admission.

Anakin glanced over at her. “Nothing to be afraid of, my lady,” he said. His voice was too low, too even, and he wouldn't quite make eye contact; but after a moment, his lips twitched. In a more normal tone, he gave a little grin and said “After all, we've got R2 with us!”

Artoo gave a cheerful series of beeps that, if Padmé's Binary was accurate, translated to a very rude suggestion as to where Anakin could shove his sarcasm because Artoo was the one carrying this entire mission.

“He's probably right,” Ashla commented, tail lazily thumping against the floor.

Anakin laughed, an unforced sound; Padmé relaxed hearing it, and Artoo gave a satisfied whistle and rolled off to get in line for their food.

The tension eased further once the engines began to rumble and the transport ship lifted off. For a while they didn't speak, eating their bland soup with the daemons maintaining careful distance at their feet. But finally, Padmé glanced up to find Anakin watching her with that crystal-eyed, all-encompassing focus. It was much less uncomfortable this time; his gaze was quieter, now.

He hesitated.

“...Tell me about her,” he said finally, voice softer than she'd expected.

Padmé smiled reflexively, cheeks heating up. Sabé's unexpected proposal was such a recent development, the reminder of that tangible evidence of her love still made her blush. “I...Ani, you've met her!”

Ashla snorted. Anakin shot his daemon a reproachful look before shaking his head.

“Not really,” he told the table. “She was pretending to be you then—or, well, the Queen—which, I guess that's the same thing, but...” He laughed self-consciously and looked up at her, almost shy. “I guess I just don't know what she's really like.”

Padmé's hand fluttered, not quite certain where to settle, while Parrl watched her and silently laughed. “Oh, well...she's...Well. She's...wonderful. She's kind and brave, and...gentle...Oh—Anakin, I don't know where to _start!_ ”

He laughed, awkward but genuine, and Padmé joined him, putting her face in her hands as she tried to control her wide smile and the way her heart had just started singing.

“She's _kind_ ,” she said again after a moment, her voice more under control. “She's so quiet—much quieter than me,” she added with a grin, and Anakin rolled his eyes. “She's all...fire, and steel, so people don't realize how gentle she is. And I know she doesn't get along very well with children.” Sabé did her best, bless her, but her interactions with children resembled nothing so much as that of an old family pet with its ears being pulled by a toddler, silently begging its owners to make the torment end. “But she makes me laugh, and her smile is...and she's steady, she's the most dependable person...and she's always been there. My whole life.” Padmé smiled fondly, gazing unseeing at the table. “I don't think I can ever repay her for all she's done for me.”

“Well.” Anakin picked at the smooth tabletop for a moment, then looked up with those piercing eyes. “When it's someone who loves you, maybe you just have to do what you can.”

For a moment she tensed; but there was warmth, not heat, behind the statement, and finally Padmé smiled at him. There was a hint of teasing behind it, but only a hint.

“I thought Jedi weren't allowed to love. Isn't that forbidden?”

Anakin flickered a glance around for listening ears, but no one on this ship had the time or energy to spare for eavesdropping on other people's problems.

“ _Attachment_ is forbidden,” he corrected her, shifting his weight like he was preparing to give an answer in some class for Jedi younglings. “Possession is forbidden. That's...that can mean objects, or it can mean people, too. Placing one person above the greater good, or valuing an object over a life, or feeling...entitled to them, but, um. Compassion, which I would define as _unconditional_ love, is...central, to a Jedi's life.” Suddenly realizing that Padmé was watching him with rapt interest, he laughed nervously and broke eye contact. “S-so, you might say, we are _encouraged_ to love.”

His shoulders were high and tight as he waited for a response, watching her as if afraid she would dismiss his words.

The thought couldn't have been further from her mind, and she smiled at him. “You've grown up, Anakin.” She took a sip of cold soup before adding, “I asked her to marry me two years ago, you know, but she couldn't. She just wasn't ready. We needed time, and she needed something in her life that wasn't about me. I'm glad we took it.” Holocalls and datapad-routed holonet communications were a gift; in a way it was almost having Sabé at her fingertips even in the Senate, even when normally they wouldn't have been able to hold a conversation. But she _missed_ her. All the warm words in the universe weren't the same as being able to hold her.

Anakin nodded vaguely, in what looked like approval.

“It must be hard,” he said. “Being so far away from someone that you love.”

Padmé almost agreed and left it at that. But something about the way he'd said it felt...off.

“Ani?”

He jumped slightly, and Ashla pushed herself onto her feet and rested her head in his lap.

“Tell her,” she said.

Padmé frowned. “Tell me what?”

Anakin pushed his daemon's head off his leg and shook his head., only for her to narrow her eyes and determinedly worm her way back.

“ _Tell_ her.”

“It's nothing,” he insisted.

“ _Anakin_ ,” Padmé said again, more firmly.

Anakin looked between her eyes, and those of the pair of daemons watching him expectantly, and gave in. After a long period of pained silence while he visibly struggled to find his words, he spoke to the floor between his feet.

“I've been having nightmares,” he said. “Visions. About my mother.”

* * *

They hadn't been able to openly send word to Naboo about her arrival; they simply couldn't trust that any of their communications were secure. But by now, Dormé would have sent what was on the surface a perfectly innocent letter to Sabé over the holonet. It would, of course, be a word-perfect imitation of their usual conversations, with a bit of rambling about work, a few updates on mutual friends, some questions, and assurances of love.

Somewhere in that letter would be a code word long since arranged between Panaka, Typho, and the handmaiden corps—an ordinary word, simple to work into conversation, but never used in normal communications. It signaled nothing more or less than “there's been a switch,” but it would prepare them both to school their expressions, to reveal no surprise or hesitation should there be a holocall with Dormé, to speak to her as if she were the Senator she was impersonating.

Meanwhile, the fact that the letter made no mention of other handmaidens would mean only one thing, in a signal missive. Normally the second handmaiden mentioned would be the one Padmé was now impersonating, but carefully avoiding any mention of the others—thus not reminding anyone who might be watching of the number of handmaidens that were _supposed_ to be on duty—sent a second message. And, implied, a third.

 _There's been a switch. She's coming to you, disguised, to keep her out of the line of fire;_ _be ready_ _. The situation is that dangerous_.

All of which meant that, with no fanfare or disruption of Palace schedules, a dark-skinned young woman in a handmaiden's cowl was there to open a side door and let Padmé into the servants' quarters the moment they arrived.

The poor girl. Panaka had probably had them on shifts for the past two days just in case.

“Thank you,” she said, squeezing the young woman's hand as they slipped inside. Parrl bumped heads, brief but grateful, with the black-and-white lop-eared rabbit daemon sitting at the handmaiden's feet; Anakin and Ashla kept more distance and scanned the empty hallway for threats, but they both gave polite nods of acknowledgment that were answered with a shallow bow.

“I'll send word that you've arrived, my lady,” the handmaiden told Padmé. “If you'll come with me, the Queen is holding an urgent meeting. We can offer you some refreshment until she's ready to receive you.” The young woman looked over and smiled. “It won't be long, Senator. Her Majesty is very fond of you; I assure you your visit is a priority.”

Parrl's stub of a tail wiggled smugly, and Padmé laughed. It was a relief to be here, back on Naboo, in such achingly familiar surroundings. It almost felt like the old days.

She stepped through a high, arched door as their guide held it open, recognizing the finest of the throne room's antechambers. She set her bags down against the wall, knelt to ruffle Parrl's fur, and then stood as the handmaiden tactfully retreated. There was a pitcher of ice and some familiar colored bottles arranged on a small table, and Padmé moved to pour herself a glass of nectar.

The sound of her name from across the chamber was no louder than a sigh, but she still turned toward it as if pulled by a tractor beam.

It was a moment of weakness like she rarely allowed herself, turning toward that familiar voice and letting the galaxy fall off her shoulders. Kwilaan's wings beat with barely a whisper in the still air as Sabé crossed to her, and Padmé made an odd sound—half gasp, half breathless laugh as his weight and sharp talons and _presence_ settled onto her shoulder. It was almost too _much_ , the scent of clean feathers and Sabé's skin and the warm, worn synthleather of her uniform, soft under Padmé's fingers as she was held close; and _Kwilaan_ , the heady vertigo of his chest against her cheek. Like flying, like falling, a double heartbeat thundering between them.

Copper in sunlight. Fierce and bright and solid and beautiful and overwhelming, fire in her soul that burned her breath away, searing without pain as she buried her face against Sabé's throat.

She felt dizzy when Kwilaan finally left her, and then hideously lonely. Sabé's arms tightened to pull her close until the disorientation of that lost connection faded; then gentle fingers tucked the veil back behind one ear, brushed tears she hadn't realized she was shedding from Padmé's cheek. She sighed happily into Sabé's collarbone before lifting her head to kiss her.

“I missed you,” she confessed.

Sabé's eyes were closed as she rested their foreheads together. Padmé recognized by now what her lover looked like, drinking in their closeness and trying to control her own turbulent emotions; so she was quiet, ran strands of dark hair between her fingers, waited for Sabé to be ready.

“I was so afraid,” she whispered after a moment. “One day they'll be luckier than you are.”

Padmé linked her hands behind Sabe's neck, turned her head to kiss her cheek.

“I am careful, Sabé. I want to come back to you. But you know I can't promise that.”

After a long moment, Sabé met her eyes with a brave, wry smile.

“Well,” she said. “I suppose there's no accounting for taste.”

It was so unexpected after the agony and tenderness of the moment that Padmé gave an undignified, violent snort of laughter and shoved her away.

“And here I came all this way just to see you,” she said with mock offense. Then, shaking her head: “Sabé, this is Anakin. You remember him.”

Sabé's lips twitched in a much easier smile. “Little Ani who couldn't count,” she said, not unkindly. “It's good to see you again. Thank you. For taking care of her.”

Anakin, who had been staring determinedly at the far wall and looking extremely pink, sketched a bow in Sabé's general direction without making eye contact. Ashla, much less capable of hiding their embarrassment, gave a drawn-out whine from where she was curled up on the floor at his feet, tail tucked between her legs and face hidden under her paws.

Parrl snickered. Kwilaan gave a little cough and busied himself grooming his feathers. Padmé desperately cast around for something to do, and then they were thankfully rescued by a polite knock at the door and Panaka's blessedly familiar face ducking into the room to inform them the Queen could see them now.

It was odd to be back in the throne room, relegated to an adviser's chair now rather than the Monarch's seat. Still, she was glad to be free of that particular responsibility. It had been too much for a fourteen-year-old girl, however ready she had thought herself; Jamillia and her wise-eyed otter daemon wore the crown no less well than Padmé had, and she didn't envy it. Bibble, unimaginative but loyal, had aged since she last saw him; so had Panaka, if less badly. And what she wouldn't have given to have Eirtaé here as well! But there was no delicately impish mare among the circle as Padmé finished her brief summary. Disappointing maybe; but to be expected. The Theed legislature didn't have many days off.

The Queen wrapped their audience up quickly once Padmé had finished her account. She couldn't blame her for that; she remembered what long audiences in full regalia felt like. Jamillia gave no more indication of stress or fatigue than Queen Amidala would have, of course; her lovely daemon slithered to the ground and fell in beside Parrl as Padmé rose to match the Queen's steady pace. The handmaidens on duty closed in behind them, giving the daemons space but itching with a protective anxiety that Padmé was intimately familiar with.

“What will you do now?” Jamillia asked her.

“Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that.” Padmé flickered a glance to Sabé that wasn't quite apologetic. “I had originally thought to go up to the lake country, but I'm afraid something's come up.” She turned briefly to nod at her Jedi shadow. “There are indications that Anakin's mother is in grave danger. I intend to investigate straight away.”

“That debt was paid,” Kwilaan said quietly. It sounded more reassuring than anything, but Sabé shook her head on Jamillia's other side. In part, it was true. The aftermath of the invasion, and the next eight years of simply _governing_ , had left few enough moments to so much as breathe; but Parrl had the memory and persistence of a daemon, and a few anxious comments about the woman they had left behind had prevented Padmé from accepting her sacrifice.

Still. Rabé's mission might have been successful, but a handful of currency and some top-of-the-line starfighter parts and the freedom her master had exchanged them for, however valuable they might have been, was not enough to repay Shmi Skywalker for what she had done for them.

To her surprise, Anakin protested.

“Now, hold on a minute, _my lady_ ,” he said. “I'm in charge of your security on this assignment, I'm supposed to protect you!”

Jamillia also looked surprised at the interruption, but unlike some people she hadn't known Anakin when he was barely tall enough to reach her waist and used the word “yippee” in normal conversation. She cocked her head thoughtfully. “If you don't think it wise, Master Jedi...”

“Oh, Anakin's not a Jedi yet,” Padmé said quickly, before it went to his head. “He's just a padawan learner.” She'd wondered at first why _he_ hadn't been the one to leap out her window after the assassin droid; after a moment it had become clear, as Soleca and Ashla both streaked after him toward the landing platform and she'd remembered the stories about Jedi and range and how one earned the rank of Master. It was said that a Jedi Master could leave their daemon on Coruscant and make at least three hyperspace jumps before they even started to feel the separation.

There were all kinds of stories about how Jedi were able to acquire that kind of range, and why some of them never could no matter how old they became and were never named Masters, but it was clear that Anakin was far too young and inexperienced to have undergone the change, whatever it was. Padmé tried not to think about it, honestly. The thought of being separated from Parrl by more than a meter was agonizing, she couldn't _imagine_ having entire star systems between them.

“Excuse me,” Anakin began, deeply incensed.

Padmé fixed him with a hard terrier glare, brooking no argument. “I owe your mother a great debt, Anakin,” she enunciated slowly. “I owe her my life and the lives and freedom of my people. If you have reason to believe she is in danger, I cannot ignore that.”

Jamillia hummed and exchanged a look with Panaka.

“You have a point,” she conceded. “We would be remiss in failing to respond to this. But I fear any response in force could give our enemies advance warning, and would certainly alert your enemies to your presence, Senator Amidala.”

“The most we could risk would be a small ship, my lady,” Panaka agreed, sounding deeply disapproving of the whole idea but not even bothering to argue that Padmé not go herself. “And people might notice if Sabé left. She _is_ my second-in-command here, after all. Two, maybe three volunteers, no more.”

Artoo, neglected in the corner, beeped with great offense.

“And the astromech,” Panaka deadpanned.

Padmé considered this.

“Then that's what we'll take,” she announced. “With your permission, Your Majesty, we'll see to the preparations immediately.”

* * *

“Land the ship here.”

It was the first time Anakin had spoken in hours. He'd initially wanted to lay in a course for Mos Espa, and Padmé had almost agreed—it made sense to start in the last place they knew Shmi had been, even if it had been eight years ago—until he said something about finding out who Watto had sold her to.

Padmé's reaction (“The Jedi didn't _tell you?!_ ”) had almost sent the ship crashing into Tatooine's pole at one-fifth the speed of light. It had taken a few minutes to sort out, and a few more minutes before Anakin could stop thanking her and pull Ashla back from her frantic whining and licking Parrl's face. After taking a moment to think over their options, Anakin had decided that a parking orbit while he meditated might be a better course of action. Even after all these years, he was still his mother's son. The Force had told him to come here; perhaps the Force would help him again now.

After an hour of silence, he'd walked back into the cockpit without a word and begun punching in coordinates.

Padmé couldn't see anything that looked like it might have a holding facility below them; she couldn't see anything but empty desert, in fact. Her first, terrible thought as she settled the ship into place was, _unmarked grave_. But a glance at Ashla made her doubt that; Anakin's daemon was focused and serious, uncharacteristically still; but her hackles were flat, no tension along her face, her tail down and quiet as she followed Anakin out of the cockpit. If Shmi was dead, they would never be this calm.

“All right, Anakin,” she called as she shut down the engines and followed him into the main body of the ship. “We should come up with a...”

A cloud of dust and the whine of speeder-bike engines were her only answer.

“...Plan.” She turned to the nearest Royal Security volunteer. “How many speeder bikes did we bring?”

“Just the two, my lady,” he answered. “But I don't think you should go out there alone!”

Padmé had already crossed to the armory rack helpfully provided by Panaka, slung a rifle and a medpack across her back, and shoved two silver Naboo blasters into her belt.

“Noted,” she informed him. Parrl leapt onto the pillion cushion, she swung one leg over the bike, and the throttle screamed as she gunned it after Anakin's retreating form.

It was a short journey, maybe twenty minutes of racing across the desert. Maybe she shouldn't have been, having visited Tatooine before, but Padmé was surprised by how _cold_ she was after the first five minutes. The heat had long since dissipated off the sand, and with the wind whipping her face she was shivering by the time she saw Anakin's taillights blink out ahead and cut her own engine to drift to a silent stop beside him.

“You shouldn't have come,” he said shortly.

“She can help,” Ashla murmured, and he didn't argue anymore.

Descending the cliff face they'd halted beside was a quick, tense business. Ashla was slightly too big to be picked up; Anakin didn't seem to notice, hoisting her with one arm under her chest and the other supporting her hips as he leapt off the cliff. After a moment Padmé crawled to the edge and peered over; she didn't see Anakin, but the air seemed to catch her and she found herself hovering a hand's breadth off the ground. Parrl quickly wriggled into the sling she'd brought for him, and Anakin lowered them off the cliff with the Force without anyone in the camp any the wiser.

“Shouldn't they have sentries?” Padmé whispered. “We should have been challenged by now. What if this is a trap?”

Anakin shook his head, eyes hard as he scanned the camp.

“Tusken raiders,” he said roughly. “They think they're untouchable in their own camp. They don't think anyone could track them, or defeat them even if they were found.” He closed his eyes, then opened them. “I sense their pain. Their fear. It's more than just her. There's two others. A human, and...a Twi'lek, I think. But something's wrong.”

Padmé checked the charge on one of her pistols. “Find your mother first. Then we'll save the others.”

Anakin gave a stiff nod and pointed toward one of the rough huts near the edge of the camp, away from the light and warmth of a central bonfire. It sounded like there was a celebration going on.

“We're lucky they've lit that,” Parrl whispered. “They'll all be night-blind.”

“These Tuskens must truly be confident,” Padmé agreed in an undertone. It was the first thing Panaka had taught them in wilderness survival. Never light a fire at night if you might be seen by unfriendly eyes, not if you have any choice; and always have a sentry facing _out_.

Any thoughts on Tusken efficiency vanished the moment Anakin finished quietly cutting a hole in the back of the prison hut.

Padmé reflexively clapped a hand over her mouth at the scent of blood filling the little space. Her free hand stayed firm on her blaster, clutching it with new determination as she checked corners and diagonals before setting Parrl to watch the entrance and dropping to her knees next to the wreck of Shmi Skywalker.

“What have they done,” she breathed in horror; then, as Anakin fumbled with filthy leather straps, she jumped and helped strip the restraints from Shmi's arms. Her hands shook only briefly as she pulled the ship's medpack off her back.

“Mom?” Anakin, for a moment, sounded like a child again. “Mom, it's okay. You're gonna be okay, I'm—I'm here now, it's...it's fine, we'll...Padmé, hurry!”

“I am, Ani, I promise.” There was...so much that needed to be done, but nothing that looked immediately life-threatening on its own. Of course not, she thought, sick. The Tuskens obviously wanted her alive as long as possible, to feel pain as long as possible...All right then, she decided, and prepared a quick-spray vial of painkillers. That was the most important thing in the short term—to stop her from suffering.

“Ani?” Shmi's voice as she stirred should have been a relief; but it was weak, cracked, slurred through obvious agony. “My little Ani...?” She tried to smile, and a split lip reopened. “Oh, you've gotten so handsome...”

Anakin smiled widely out of sheer relief at being recognized. “You're gonna be okay, mom. We're here.”

But there was still that terrible, looming sense of impending doom, even as Padmé wrapped bacta-infused gauze around some of the deepest wounds and tried desperately not to think about what was so wrong here...

“Anakin.” Ashla's voice, however hard she was trying to stay quiet, was high and tight with fear. “ _Anakin, where's Viatoris?_ ”

Parrl gave a strangled gasp behind her as Padmé and Anakin stiffened violently.

“Mom.” Anakin's voice took on a new urgency. “Mom, did they—she's not severed,” he told Padmé, nearly angrily. Shmi tried and failed to say something. “She's _not_ severed, she can't be—”

“Anakin, calm down,” she hissed with a glance over her shoulder. Then, low and urgent, “She's not severed, anyone can see that, the daemons would have known. Lady Skywalker,” she tried. “Shmi, do you know where...?”

“They took,” she said weakly, stopping to take a shuddering breath. “Took the daemons, all of them. I don't know...where...”

“Shh.” Padmé sealed the medical tape on the last of the gauze she could spare. “We'll find them. Lieutenant,” she added into her comlink. “Target located, bring the ship to my location, rendezvous in...”

“Ten minutes,” Anakin said.

“Ten minutes. No sooner unless I fail to respond to a sixty-second check-in, beginning now. Understood?”

“ _Perfectly, my lady._ ”

“Thank you. Maintain radio silence until then.” She closed the channel. “Anakin, the others, we have to free them first.”

“Without—”

“We have to free the daemons last,” she said, hating herself for it as Shmi gave a low moan. “We _have_ to, they'll break for their partners the minute they can move and then they'll know we're here.”

“What if they _can't_ move?”

Padmé steeled herself and, before she could talk herself out of it, replied, “Then we carry them. It's better than leaving anyone behind.”

Anakin hesitated, then nodded, and she gave a sigh of relief as he visibly conceded to her authority. “I'll bring them here,” he said. Then, that child's fear again: “Stay with her?”

Parrl gave a low, deadly snarl. Padmé echoed it in her eyes and the click of a disengaging safety.

“For as long as it takes.”

It took, contrary to Anakin's estimation, no more than five minutes for him to locate and free the other surviving prisoners. The young Twi'lek was able to walk when he brought her in, if only barely. The human, a young man—barely more than a boy, really, he looked Anakin's age—was in worse shape even than Shmi, and Padmé had never been more grateful for Captain Panaka's first-aid courses as she injected immune boosters and bound infected lacerations, burns, what looked like bite marks from some kind of animal...

“He tried to fight,” Shmi wheezed, half-conscious, eyes glazed with pain. Padmé nodded, tapped her comlink for the sixty-second check-in, and tried to stem the bleeding. If they had been an hour later, the boy wouldn't have survived the night.

“We know where the daemons are,” Anakin whispered. “Padmé, they're on the other side of the _camp_.”

Parrl gagged. Padmé reached for him instinctively, clutching his fur as she checked the time.

“You have five minutes,” she said. Then, looking at the half-dead victims still shaking with the agony of separation, she held Parrl closer and whispered, “How _could_ they? I know they don't have daemons, but...”

“They don't have daemons because they don't have _souls_ ,” Anakin snarled, his voice starting to rise. “You didn't grow up here. They're like _animals_ , Padmé, all of them! We can't let them—”

“Be _quiet_ , they'll hear you,” Padmé hissed. “What matters now is saving these people.”

For a long, terrible moment, Anakin clutched his lightsaber hilt, breathing heavily, and she didn't think he would obey. Then:

“Fine.”

From that moment, as terrified as they might have been at the time, the Tuskens' prisoners were safe. It was a long, agonizing wait, Padmé expecting every moment that one of the young prisoners would give into their obvious pain and scream, or for Shmi or the half-dead young man's rattling breaths to stop. They were too far away to hear the snap-hiss of an igniting lightsaber, when it happened; but the cries of the Tusken raiders, the high screams of blasterfire and deflected blasterfire, that they heard.

And they heard the ominous rumble of deep-space engines like the stars themselves descending for vengeance, and even that was almost drowned out under the rough, wild moan of a lion's roar.

The pilot settled the sleek silverfish hull as close to Padmé's position as possible. It was almost too far, when none of them were capable of so much as crawling unassisted; but the Royal Security volunteers who had been so unceremoniously left behind how had something to do, and one of them broke for the hut while her brothers-in-arms took positions on the gangplank with Nubian blasters and picked off anyone who came close.

“Take her first,” Padmé ordered, nodding to the trembling Twi'lek. For her part she nudged Parrl out of the doorway and took up a position to one side, helping to provide cover fire. She could hear the distant hum of a flashing lightsaber, now, growing steadily closer as Anakin fought his way to the ship while protecting—

The three prisoners gasped in unison as, finally, streaking wild-eyed across no-man's land, their daemons crashed back into sensing range.

The Twi'lek's reached her first, a little mouse that vanished up a pant leg as she limped toward the ship with the Royal Security lieutenant supporting her weight; his partner almost collapsed, before pushing the lieutenant back toward the hut and stumbling determinedly onward by herself. Close behind her was a sight Padmé never wanted to see again, a little red vixen with unending streaks of gold flowing off her sides as she bolted across the sand. She shouldn't have been able to move at all, let alone outstrip the lion galloping at her heels; but she did, pushed on by a kind of madness, and Padmé actually had to throw herself out of the way as the fox collided head-on, never slowing, with her mangled partner.

Viatoris was last, tripping over his own paws and dangerously unsteady, and his eyes showed pure despair as he realized he wouldn't fit through the main door of the hut.

“Go around!” Parrl cried, scrambling to the edge of his range and throwing his head to the side, trying to demonstrate what he meant. “ _Go around! Back entrance!_ ”

Light came back into the lion's eyes as he threw himself forward with new determination. Padmé allowed herself to look over her shoulder in time to see him shouldering his way through to bury his face against Shmi's shoulder, speaking in a low rumble for her and her alone, and with her daemon finally close enough to touch she broke down and _screamed_.

After that everything moved quickly. Someone, and Padmé intended to find out who and promote them, had prepared stretchers preemptively. The vixen shrieked blindly as the Royal Security marksmen switched out, Anakin's arrival freeing up another to run back for them; she launched herself at a newcomer's hare until Parrl drove her back, then leaped back onto her partner's chest as he was hoisted onto the stretcher and taken off at a dead run.

Shmi, who Padmé would have sworn couldn't have rolled over under her own power, was bleeding through her bandages as she hauled herself onto Viatoris' back; but most of the pain was gone from her eyes, and her grip was strong now.

“Go,” Padmé told her. “I'll cover you.”

She was telling the truth, though with three Royal Security Force soldiers and Anakin in full fury one more source of cover fire wasn't really necessary.

Neither was her comlink, anymore, and she tore it off her wrist the moment Shmi was clear and scanned the contents of the hut.

“There,” Parrl barked, and she nodded as she found the most valuable-looking object in the room—an electrowhip hilt, by the look of it. She pulled a pin from her hair and fiddled with the controls until the casing opened, then ripped the locator beacon and power source from her comlink and sealed them inside.

 _They don't think anyone could track them._ The Tuskens weren't stupid; they were probably right, if no one had rescued these people already. Her priority right now was evacuating the prisoners, and it wasn't the place of their party to be judge, jury and executioner.

She would leave that to the families and towns of the raiders' victims.

Parrl gave a low snarl, and there was nothing cute or comical about the fire in his eyes.

“All right.” Padmé checked the charge on her blaster, grimaced, and switched to the spare. “Count of three, we run.”

* * *

Technically, Padmé was still in hiding. Technically, Captain Panaka outranked everyone on the planet save Jamillia herself when it came to matters of political and military security. And, technically, Anakin still had to protect her.

All of which combined into what Padmé couldn't help but feel was an excessive degree of secrecy upon their arrival back on Naboo.

Their rescued prisoners badly needed immediate medical care; the Twi'lek still had a slave tracker that had been disabled by the Tuskens but could come back online at any moment, Shmi's internal and head injuries were more serious than Padmé had thought, and the boy with the fox daemon had finally slipped into unconsciousness not long after being brought into the ship. It was imperative that they be transferred to a hospital, and Panaka had more compassion than he liked to pretend. He had put arrangements in place before they even broke atmosphere, but despite their increasingly violent protests he refused to authorize _her_ to so much as leave the hangar bay for an hour.

In the end he cheated, and sent Sabé in to do his dirty work, Padmé couldn't shout at _her_ for being an obstructionist rules-lawyer, and in the end her miserable, reluctant look had convinced even Anakin.

Panaka had provided solid cover stories involving a merchant ship attacked by Trandoshan pirates along an unorthodox patrol route. Shmi and the others would be safe and safely anonymous until the threat against Padmé's life was over, and then they could see her and start contacting any family the newcomers might have.

“Go up to the lake country,” Sabé had suggested. “We'll call you every day to keep you informed, I _promise_. I'm so sorry...”

“Come with me?” Padmé had asked wistfully, because Sabé was the only thing that could possibly distract her from worrying. Panaka, who still didn't seem convinced that she wouldn't shoot her way out of the Palace to visit the hospital anyway, had agreed no matter how unhappy he looked about it.

If truth be told: Varykino had been good for them.

Sabé's discomfort had slowly lessened as Anakin made it clear that he didn't blame _her_ for having to be here. After the first few days, as reports from the capital reached them that his mother was recovering and even the boy had stabilized, he started to come alive among the green and the water. Varykino was quiet, soft and cool and full of life, and after so long trapped on Coruscant, so much violence, it was all Padmé had ever wanted to curl up in cushions on the balcony, head tucked against Sabé's chest, with Parrl held between them, while Anakin meditated by the water.

“I like that Sabé's here,” he volunteered one night at dinner, unprompted. “Your presence is calmer around her. It's...soothing. Feeling it helps me to calm my emotions.”

“I take that as a great compliment, Master Jedi,” Sabé had responded softly, and he'd given her a shy grin, and since then Ashla and Kwilaan were much more friendly toward one another and Anakin was more free with jokes and comments.

Just under two weeks after their return, just under two weeks of peace, and they'd gotten word from Obi-Wan—but not the word they'd been waiting for.

“You're not going to contact Captain Panaka?” said Anakin, slipping into the pilot's seat while Padmé ran frantic pre-flight checks.

“Captain Panaka controls the planetary defenses,” was Sabé's deadpan response, and Anakin actually laughed as Padmé signaled the all-clear and he opened the throttle for Geonosis.

He returned them three days and a handful of battles later, dusty and ragged, with nexu claw-marks across Padmé's shoulders and Sabé nursing more than one blaster wound in locations terrifyingly close to fatal.

Panaka was somewhat less than impressed. If the Separatists hadn't nearly done such a good job of it, Padmé would have given even odds on her former security adviser killing her himself.

“You're fired,” he informed Sabé.

She gave a pained laugh that turned into a hiss as a medical droid injected her with a bacta serum. “Yes, Captain.”

“You should be court-marshaled.”

“Yes, Captain.”

“I expect you on duty at 0700 tomorrow morning.”

“ _Kriff_ —ah, yes, Captain.”

Panaka glared at her, gave a deep, gruff sigh at the exact same moment as his daemon, and then stalked out with her lumbering grumpily at his heels.

“That could have been worse,” Anakin offered, briefly looking up from flexing his new prosthetic hand. He hadn't stopped playing with it since the medical droids released him. Shmi had reacted with concern but not surprise when they visited her earlier, which had helped him get over his initial reaction.

They'd left him sitting on her bed, with Ashla and Viatoris having their own desperately happy reunion in the corner. They had been surrounded by roughly every member of the handmaiden corps remaining on Naboo, including Eirtaé and Constance, all of whom had apparently been camping in Shmi's room in shifts since she arrived. Eirtaé had already contacted Shmi's family, sent them Padmé's comlink frequency, and arranged Naboo citizenship for the Twi'lek slave girl. The things people got up to around here when Padmé turned her back for five minutes.

Apparently having left her to rest, Anakin had wandered in halfway through Panaka's lecture and then stayed as a spectator. Maybe it hadn't been such a good idea to let him grow less intimidated by Sabé.

“He was going awfully easy on you,” Padmé agreed. “He normally says 0500 at least.”

Sabé groaned and dropped her head into her hands. Padmé, taking pity on her, put a careful arm around her waist and kissed her jaw.

“Well,” she said. “You could always resign in protest. Come live on Coruscant with me. You could plan dinners, play nice with diplomats, bat your eyelashes and hang off my arm at fancy parties _every week_...”

“You're cruel, my lady,” Sabé muttered. She turned her head and kissed Padmé, softer and longer than she'd expected. “I want a divorce.”

Anakin didn't say a word, but Ashla's ears pricked, her tail dropped, and they both looked deeply hurt that they'd missed the wedding.

“Six months,” Parrl told the other daemon, and they both perked up again.

Sabé leaned into her, turning to murmur into Padmé's ear.

“Before you leave,” she countered, barely audible. “It doesn't have to be public. Just before you leave.”

Parrl blinked rapidly, tail stilling, and Padmé paused before whispering, “You're certain?”

“ _Entirely_.”

She smiled. Was it wrong, to want this moment of peace and happiness while the galaxy plunged into war around them?

“Before I leave.”

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Daemon notes:
> 
> Esperanza: "Hope". Wolves are notoriously shy--they prefer to avoid conflict, keep to themselves. They're also intensely family-related and loyal, and they're endurance hunters; they can play the long game, as well as defend themselves in a sudden crisis. I thought she suited Bail well.
> 
> Dorme's daemon is a phalarope, a little gull-like bird that comes up in google searches for the best fathers in the animal kingdom; fitting for the Team Mom Handmaiden, and a small bird's flight distance certainly fits as well; Dorme's always struck me as a bit anxious.
> 
> Soleca: Esperanto again, this time for "lonely". Because I am really, really mean to Obi-Wan.
> 
> Ashla: settled as a pariah dog, as noted by Padme and for the reasons expressed there. If anyone is familiar with the blog streetdogmillionaires, she's basically a fusion of Chalo and Priya.


End file.
